Kendrick Lamar’s haunting, yet beautiful new music video for Humble warms the part of my heart that can’t stop Instagramming with the a6 filter on #vsco. It’s alarming and exposes a variety of black aesthetics pertaining to violence, endurance, pain, and sex. Directed by Dave Meyers & the Little Homies, the video is seductive… Read More

YEAR END WRAP UP Shock and surprise paved the heartbreaking year of 2016. In the most bleak corners of the year we lost more music idols and icons than we knew how to deal with. The new year was met with the terrible loss of David Bowie and soon after came the loss of  Maurice White,… Read More

It’s a pleasantly quiet Sunday morning and you’re cruising down a west Oakland promenade littered with the remnants of last night’s youthful debauchery. Broken Hennessy bottles and stomped-out Swisher Sweet roaches laying damp in the gutters evoke the evening’s regrettable decisions and exacerbate your own mild hangover merely with the images they conjure. You stop… Read More

The summers of 2014 and 2015 could not have been more different for me. 2014 was the start of a new relationship, and 2015 was the difficult ending. Although the two summers were a year apart, and although they corresponded to two opposite emotional poles of my life, I associate both summers with many of… Read More

If you’re still wondering what the song of the summer is, you probably should just come to terms with it not existing or understand that it already exists and you just don’t like it as much as the other participants of summer. If you have chosen to come to terms with the nonexistence and need… Read More

Photo courtesy of MTV Since Oakland’s G-Eazy released his first commercially successful album, “These Things Happen,” on June 23, his name has been popping up in rap circles all across the nation. The album is 16-deep with absolute bangers, and while you wouldn’t have stumbled upon his music on iTunes until just recently, he really… Read More

Hey all. Welcome 2 my new series, “Notes from the Underground,” based (v loosely, only in name) on Dostoevsky’s novel by the same name. The plan is to bring to all of you my penchant for compulsively mining the deepest corners of the Soundcloud Esotercica-verse. If this sounds daunting, don’t worry. I’m doing the work, you… Read More

In the first four minutes of Schoolboy Q’s new album, Oxymoron, he says the word “gangsta” 67 times. Actually, 66. His 4 year old daughter, Joy, kicks off the album with the line “Fuck rap, my daddy a gangsta,” cementing her place as the hardest 4 year old in the rap game. Through the first… Read More

~Random disclaimer~ This isn’t a “Best Mixtapes 2013,” because there are plenty of those out there. It’s just 5 random tapes that I bang with, that didn’t necessarily get the same coverage as Acid Rap or Run The Jewels type projects.   I$0lyf3 2, by KR: Since getting my show in September, I’ve spent a lot of time on mixtape websites… Read More

Artist: Run the Jewels Album: Run the Jewels Label: Fools Gold Records Track List: 1. Run The Jewels//2. Banana Clipper feat. Big Boi//3. 36″ Chain//4. DDFH//5. Sea Legs//6. Job Well Done feat. Until The Ribbons Break//7. No Come Down//8. Get It//9. Twin Hype Back feat. Prince Paul as Chest Rockwell//10. A Christmas Fucking Miracle Just… Read More